The President has his usual briefing on board Air Force One a short
time ago, en route to Columbus. Upon arrival there will be a USA
Freedom Corps greeter, Leslie Gagne, who is an active volunteer with
the Special Olympics. Then the President will make remarks at a
Bush-Cheney 2004 luncheon. Then we will go to Central Aluminum Company
in Columbus. Central Aluminum employees 80 people, it's a small
business that's been in operation since '64, and produces customized
aluminum products like window frames, picture frames, handles on filing
cabinets, things of that nature.

One thing, in fact, the President will talk about, may touch on in
his remarks, is that comprehensive energy legislation will help provide
more affordable and stable supply of natural gas, which will help
improve economic security by allowing companies like Central Aluminum
to expand or reinvest from the savings it would realize on what it pays
for natural gas now, they have seen a significant increase in its
natural gas prices over the last year.

Then the President will make remarks on energy and the economy.
The President will be urging Congress to get a comprehensive energy
legislation -- get comprehensive energy legislation passed this year,
and stress that that's important to strengthening our economic
security. And as I said, he will talk about how a stable, reliable,
affordable energy supplies will boost our economy even more.

Then following that, we go to San Antonio. The Freedom Corps
greeter there will be Thom Ricks, who is active in a nonprofit group
called "Christmas in April," which helps rehabilitate homes for low
income homeowners, particularly people with disabilities, seniors and
families with children. And then the President will participate in the
Bush-Cheney 2004 reception in San Antonio this evening, before we
return to Crawford.

A couple of announcements. Judge Gonzales will be the special
guest on "Ask the White House," today at 1:00 p.m. Today marks the one
year anniversary of the date that the President outlined his plan for
timely consideration of judicial nominees. This was a plan that the
President outlined that would provide a permanent, bipartisan solution
to help end delays and politics that have undermined the judicial
confirmation process.

Other announcements, scheduling updates. We've already announced
on Monday that the President will be participating in a campaign event
in Alabama. He will also participate in an event and will make remarks
on the economy while we're in Alabama. Then on November 7th, we've got
a campaign event in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. On November 10th, a
campaign event in Little Rock, Arkansas. And also on the 10th, in
Greenville-Spartanburg, South Carolina. On the 13th, we have campaign
events in Orlando, Florida and Fort Myers, Florida. On the 25th of
November, the President will participate in campaign events in Las
Vegas, Nevada and Scottsdale, Arizona.

And with that --

Q These are all day trips? All the campaign events you just
announced?

MR. McCLELLAN: Should be. I don't know that for sure at this
point, it's a little bit early to get that far into it, but it should
be.

Q Any reaction to the latest GDP figures -- fastest since
1984?

MR. McCLELLAN: Our economy is growing and getting stronger. I
think today's numbers are another positive sign that the tax relief
advocated and signed by the President is working. We are getting more
money into people's pockets, money that people can use to invest and
spend and get our economy growing. And I think it's important to keep
in mind that most independent economic forecasters predict that our
economy will continue to grow above the historical averages of 3.3
percent since 1960, but that we won't see growth as fast as we are this
quarter.

Q We won't see it as fast?

MR. McCLELLAN: In coming quarters, most independent forecasters
believe that it will continue to grow above historical averages, but
not as fast as we see in this quarter. While the economy is moving in
the right direction because of the action that we have taken, there is
more work to be done, and I think the President may talk a little bit
about this in his remarks later today at the Central Aluminum Company.

We need to continue to act to build upon the steps we have taken to
get our economy growing so that we can continue to translate growth
into job creation. There are signs that the labor market is
improving. And the President will continue to emphasize that there's
more to do, and that we need to -- Congress needs to take steps to act
on his six-point plan for strengthening our economy even more. And
that includes -- specifically, today, the focus will be on passing a
comprehensive energy plan, but I think he will touch again on his
six-point plan for strengthening our economy even more.

Q Secretary Snow is taking the foreign exchange report to
Congress today. I don't know what it says, but inevitably it's out
already. Do you have anything to say on that?

Q Iran says it's not going to hand over al Qaeda operatives.
Does that mean that we're not going to be willing to reopen limited
talks with Iran?

MR. McCLELLAN: Again, I don't think that Secretary Armitage's
remarks said exactly that. They reiterated what we have previously
said, that if it's in our interest, we are prepared to have talks on
areas of mutual concern. We have in the past, on Iraq and Afghanistan,
but -- yes, we've made it clear that -- and will continue to make it
clear to Iran -- that they need to turn over those al Qaeda members in
Iran to their countries of origin.

Q Isn't that a condition?

MR. McCLELLAN: That's an important step to changing relations.
Iran needs to change its behavior in a number of ways, and that is
one.

Q Is that a condition, though, for restarting some sort of
limited --

MR. McCLELLAN: Again, we haven't said that we're having
discussions with them. There are existing channels of communication
that we have had in place and continue to have in place. But what
Secretary Armitage was talking about the other day was simply
reiterating our policy toward Iran.

Q There's a story in the Times today saying you want to speed
up training of Iraqi security forces in Iraq. Is that --

MR. McCLELLAN: Well, one, you heard the President's remarks in the
news conference the other day, you've heard me talk about this issue a
little bit over the past couple of days. And Secretary Rumsfeld, I
believe, is briefing later today. And I think it's appropriate for our
military leaders to be the ones that talk about the steps we are taking
militarily.

Again, I talked about some of this yesterday, the President talked
in his news conference about how we're constantly working to adapt to
or adjust to the enemy. There are still dangerous people in Iraq and
dangerous areas within Iraq. Our military is working to enhance and
accelerate our efforts, including accelerating our efforts to get more
Iraqis involved in the security of their country. There are some
85,000 Iraqis already involved in the security of their country.
They're involved in the police forces. Tens of thousands are involved
in the police forces. They're involved in the civil defense forces.
Iraqis are involved in the -- continue to be more involved in the
border patrol. Iraqis are -- you're seeing the initial troops in a new
Iraqi army. So we are continuing to work to accelerate those efforts
as we move forward on the security front.

I would reiterate, too, that our military continues to stay on the
-- our coalition continues to say on the offensive in Iraq to go after
the holdouts of the former regime and the foreign terrorists who are in
the country. They are working on targeted strikes and working to be
able to deploy quickly to prevent attacks from happening in the first
place. They are working to strengthen our border security, as well,
along with getting more Iraqis involved in those efforts. We are
working to improve our intelligence gathering, so that we can have more
actionable intelligence to act on.

Q China and North Korea have agreed to -- in principle to
restart the six-party discussions. Do you guys really think -- does
the administration really think that is North Korea's intent, and is
this idea for a security agreement still being moved forward?

MR. McCLELLAN: Well, we are encouraged by the reports we have seen
that North Korea has agreed in principle to continue the six-party
talks. The President has made it very clear that the multilateral or
the multi-party process provides the best hope for achieving our shared
objective of getting North Korea to abandon its nuclear ambitions and
end its nuclear weapons program. We appreciate the involvement of
China and their active participation in the talks.

Q What about the security agreement, the idea for some kind of
a security thing, is that moving forward still?

MR. McCLELLAN: That's -- we want to work through the multilateral
framework on providing some sort of security assurance. But North
Korea must end its nuclear weapons program in a verifiable and
irreversible way. We've made that very clear.